InterNutter

(Well, you mentioned prior experience in that last snippet, so…)

T'reka and hugs.

(also if the story you mentioned being sparked from that gets written, I totally want in on your beta reading list and will probably buy it multiple times)

[AN: After I finish writing the Hevun’s Child series I will be working on The Amity Incident. 120K word goal. But before that, I think I deserve a week’s rest, don’t you?]

There was a human in her hide. More disturbing was that she had picked up a few phrases of Galstand and Numidid and used them. “Peace I mean! No to run, pleasing. I want am ask.”

Good greater Powers. Three sort-of sentences. Context and purpose. The warning notice was right. These creatures adapted quickly.

T'reka hadn’t even noticed they were watching her, before now.

She did her best at human. “You are no arms?”

The human had tight-fitting clothes, and displayed her empty hands.

T'reka performed the same pantomime. “I am T'reka.”

“Trekker,” repeated the human. “I am Susan.”

“Su-syn,” T'reka tried. There was going to be mangling on all sides, she was certain. And, she noted, both sides were willing to forgive lingual errors. “I am surprise. This is standard behaving not.”

“We curious-crazy,” said Su-syn. “We you see watch. We you hear talk. We why think.”

“And come you me going? Danger might be.”

“We watch, too. No danger find.”

“How-when?”

“Watch we now,” said Su-syn. “Djak?”

T'reka shrieked as one of the bushes stood up and sprouted a human head.

“Peace I mean,” said the ex-bush in Numidid. “Is costume. Clothing-for-hiding.”

They could explain new concepts using words they’d just picked up. Adaptive, indeed.

“How more many bush is alive?” T'reka quavered.

Five more of them sheepishly stood up and revealed themselves. T'reka swore she recognized some of the foliage from nearby her hidden shelter and base. Many of them were showing their horrible, sharp-looking teeth.

“Poker faces,” cautioned Su-syn in human. She accompanied it with a gesture with finger and thumb down her face. In broken Numidid/Galstand, she said, “We show teeth for not threat. Is for… shame. This time. Is for happy, other time.” Then the human moved. Held T'reka inside both her arms. Squeezed.

T'reka screamed. Involuntarily. “DON’T EAT ME!”

Su-syn instantly let go. “Peace I mean. Is hostile no. Is gesture comforting use.”

One of the bushes tentatively offered a container. “Mealworms?” he enquired.

“Not the time, Djak,” said Su-syn in human. “Baby steps.”

T'reka had seen their infants walking. Clumsy, stomping and easily avoided because the little creatures only had two modes - loud and asleep. This made a modicum of sense. “Baby steps,” she agreed.

The humans were very careful when they came into physical contact with her from then on.

[Muse food remaining: 10 (fic war prompts: 0) Submit a prompt! Ask a question! Buy my stories!]

It is said that life is a comedy to those who think,
And a tragedy to those who feel.  I never could figure out
Which it was for me.  May you have better luck. – RecklessPrudence

(#00308)

T-shirts had made a comeback, though many cogniscents who had taken them up had not grasped some of the basic concepts. Like, they had to feature something witty, controversial, or downright offensive.

Some, Rael noted, had gone for profound.

Shayde, sporting one that read, Life

Adhuc Vivo!
(It’s Latin, look it up)

Yes, the parentheses were on the gravestone too. – RecklessPrudence

(#00307)

[AN: For those too lazy to do as the parentheses suggest, it translates out to “Thus far, alive.” which is a very ironic thing to stick on a gravestone]

It was a long trip home, and lead naturally to introspection.

“Plant a tree and think of me,” Rael recited. “Did you choose that epitaph?”

“I

The last Homo Sapiens Sapiens lay dying. Who hears their final words? Who are our species’ successors?

Go as uplifting or as dark as you wish. – RecklessPrudence

(#00305)

The machines were very good at keeping him alive. They had done so for almost two hundred years.

And it wasn’t fair that a majority of them were spent in a bed, watching other innovations and marvelous things happen in the world. Watching the new definition of humanity do marvelous

Luckily, the researchers were actually _aware_ of the past century-plus of musing on the subject, and didn’t react like paranoid idiots.

Whether the creation of the AI was intentional or not, I leave up to you. – RecklessPrudence

(#00304)

Gravity generators needed a Cargo Cult to make them go. Each machine was the same, up until the final pass, where the Cargo Cult took over and the machine was ‘birthed’.

The cult called itself the Nae'hyn, and was